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In an undated letter written at Arrowhead one rainy day in May 1851, Herman Melville told his friend Nathaniel Hawthorne where and how he intended to finish his "Whale" of a book--then still in manuscript, and not yet titled Moby-Dick:
In a week or so, I go to New York, to bury myself in a third-story room, and work and slave on my "Whale" while it is driving through the press. That is the only way I can finish it now, — I am so pulled hither and thither by circumstances. The calm, the coolness, the silent grass-growing mood in which a man ought always to compose, that, I fear, can seldom be mine. Dollars damn me; and the malicious Devil is forever grinning in upon me, holding the door ajar.
-- as transcribed and printed by Julian Hawthorne in Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife: A Biography Volume 1 (Boston, 1884)
Short on time and money, Melville felt he could only get his work-in-progress done in New York City, under pressure. There, added pressure (on top of whatever mental and physical stress he might have been experiencing in Pittsfield) would be externally imposed by the routines and machinery of book production in a busy Manhattan printer's office. Melville's plan was to crank out the final chapters while the completed ones were "driving through the press." Evidently Melville had already made arrangements for stereotyping of the completed portion of his "Whale" manuscript by Robert W. Craighead (employed in the making of Typee by Wiley and Putnam, and The Literary World by Evert A. Duyckinck). However, the end was yet to be written. Soon ("in a week or so") Melville would leave Pittsfield for New York City, there to enter what Hershel Parker describes in the Historical Note for the 1988 Northwestern-Newberry edition of Moby-Dick (page 629) as the "intense final phase of intermingled composition and proofreading."
As he told Hawthorne, Melville expected to "work and slave" at writing and correcting proof pages, right along with the typesetters. In figurative terms, writing under pressure that intense meant being hounded by "the malicious Devil" whom Melville imagined as "forever grinning in upon me, holding the door ajar." As generally recognized, the insatiable "Devil" of a doorman in the quoted passage is Melville's humorous way of designating the Printer's Devil. In other words, "not Satan but the printer's errand boy, waiting to carry new pages of manuscript to the compositor" (Historical Note, N-N Moby-Dick page 630).
In New York City Herman had somebody he could and usually did stay with, his lawyer-brother Allan Melville. The New York City Directory for 1851 gives Allan Melville's new home address as East 31st street at North Lexington Avenue. As also shown in the 1851 City Directory, Allan's office at 14 Wall street then functioned as Herman Melville's business address in Manhattan. In the Northwestern-Newberry edition of Moby-Dick (Historical Note, pages 629-30) Hershel Parker placed the "third-story room" where Melville intended to "work and slave" away on his Whale-book in the building on E. 31st where Melville presumably stayed, Allan's new and "inconveniently" situated residence uptown:
"In New York, where he planned to finish work, he would be in unfamiliar surroundings, at Allan's new house on Thirty-First Street near Lexington, much farther (and inconveniently) uptown, and in a room which by its location was almost sure to be stiflingly hot."
Melville experts since the late 1980's have followed Parker's lead, for example John Bryant in Melville and Repose: The Rhetoric of Humor in the American Renaissance (Oxford University Press, 1993) page 228:
"To facilitate productivity, he lodged with his brother in New York City, both to escape distractions of Arrowhead and to be closer to his printer."
and Kevin J. Hayes in Herman Melville (Resaktion Books, 2017) page 133:
"Herman settled into Allan's Manhattan home to finish Moby-Dick. When it was nearly complete, he returned to Craighead's print shop in late June, retrieved a bundle of proofs, and left New York for Pittsfield."
In Herman Melville: A Biography Volume 1, 1819-1851 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996) Parker envisions Melville "writing in Allan's third-story room, under the roof, on bad days an ovenlike cell, when he was not making the trip to and from the compositor's plant at the southern tip of the island" (page 844).
Until now, nobody has pointed out the more likely location of the "third-story room" where Melville intended to finish writing Moby-Dick, in the establishment of his hired stereotyper Robert Craighead. As revealed in newspaper accounts of the fire on January 23, 1852 that destroyed the whole building including his printing office, Craighead operated his printing business on the third-stories of adjacent properties, the large four-story brick building at 112 Fulton street, on the southwest corner of Fulton and Dutch, and the adjoining building at 114 Fulton.
"The third stories of the two buildings were occupied by Robert Craighead as a book-printing office, and every thing he had in the two rooms was destroyed." -- New York Times, January 24, 1852
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| NY Literary World - January 31, 1852 |
... The Literary World has been printed since its very commencement, by Robert Craighead, at 112 Fulton street, a large building with openings into the adjoining lofts, supplied with steam power, and filled by a numerous body of pressmen, compositors, and others, through the third floor, while on the fourth was extended the Bindery of E. Walker, one of the most active in the city. The extent of business going on upon these two stories alone of the premises, will be comprehended from a statement of part of the losses of editors, authors, publishers, &c., sustained by the destruction of Mr. Craighead's printing-office.
... Most of our printing-offices are insecure, confused, rickety-looking quarters, with narrow entrances, associated frequently with that huge paper box of combustibles, a Bindery--poorly arranged for light--with steam power on the premises, and badly ventilated, oppressive to health, opposed to the necessary neatness, and utterly insecure for property. -- "Marks and Remarks" in The Literary World No. 261, January 31, 1852, pages 87-88
Although contemporary reports of the fire in the New York Times (January 24, 1852) and The Literary World (January 31, 1852) are cited in the N-N edition of Moby-Dick, no mention is there made of the specific reference in the NY Times article to Craighead's place of business or "rooms" being on "the third-stories" of neighboring edifices.
24 Jan 1852, Sat The New York Times (New York, New York) Newspapers.com
Transcribed below from the New York Times of January 24, 1852:
NEW-YORK CITY.
THE FIRE IN FULTON STREET. — The fire in Fulton street yesterday morning was more destructive of property than any conflagration we have had in this city in a long time. The fire originated in the bindery of E. Walker, in the fourth stories of the buildings Nos. 112 and 114 Fulton-street....
... The third stories of the two buildings were occupied by Robert Craighead as a book-printing office, and every thing he had in the two rooms was destroyed. He was engaged in printing a number of works, two of which were bound. Among them was a portion of Miss Cooper's new work, and of the "Tales and Traditions of Hungary" by Madame Pulszky. He had commenced printing for the Smithsonian Institute, a large Dictionary of the Dacotah language, by Rev. Mr. Riggs. Fortunately the manuscript had not yet been sent in, and hence it has escaped. We understand that the copying of the work for the printer, from the author's notes, occupied about one year, and to print it Mr. C. had to procure a number of letters of a peculiar character. A number of works were being printed in this office and of course the copy was destroyed, among them several manuscript works. Mr. Craighead's loss is about $25,000, and he is insured for but $14,000. Fortunately the plates of a number of standard works were in the vaults and are saved. Mr. Craighead has already made arrangements to continue his business, having hired rooms and procured type and presses.
And below, the account of the "Great Fire in Fulton Street" transcribed from the New York Evening Mirror of January 23, 1852.
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| New York Evening Mirror - January 23, 1852 via Genealogy Bank |
Great Fire in Fulton Street.
About two o'clock this morning a fire broke out in the large five story building, No. 112 Fulton, corner of Dutch streets. This building, with its entire contents, also No. 114 adjoining, was entirely destroyed. The next building, 116, was slightly injured. The buildings, 112 and 114, were occupied by Stilwell and Montrose, clothiers; Robert W. Craighead, the extensive printer; Edward Walker, the book-binder, and some other parties whose names we have not learned. Messrs. Stillwell and Montrose, and Craighead and Walker, were the principal sufferers. The two latter were insured to some extent.
The night being intensely cold, and the materials in the buildings highly inflammable, it was almost in vain, with freezing hose, to battle the fire. It raged with intense fury.
The two buildings were burned into the very cellars, and now present a scene of smoky desolation. The firemen worked bravely on the occasion. On the opposite corner of Dutch street, which leads from Fulton South, the building occupied by Wells & Webb, extensive dealers in printing materials, was considerably damaged by the falling walls of 112. One or two buildings on the opposite side of Fulton street were considerably damaged. The rear of the Home Journal publication office was badly scorched, files of papers, &c., being destroyed.
Building 114, owned by Gale & Son, was fully insured in the Eagle Company. Watkins, bootmaker, who occupied the lower floor, was insured for $5,000 in the North American Company.Building 112, owned by a Mr. Strong, was fully insured. Stillwell & Montrose, clothiers, who occupied a large portion of the building, lost their whole stock, valued at $40,000; insured in various offices $25,000.
The building 116, slightly injured, is owned by Gale & Son, and fully insured in the Bowery Insurance Company. The whole loss must be over $100,000.
In Mr. Craighead's department were destroyed a Dacotah Dictionary, in press for the Smithsonian Institute; a portion of the edition of Garrigue's Iconographic Encyclopaedia; the plates of Madame Pulzky's Tales and Traditions of Hungary, publishing by Redfield; next week's Literary World, which will not, however, prevent its prompt appearance.
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| New York Tribune - January 24, 1852 |
DESTRUCTIVE FIRE.— At 1 3/4 o'clock yesterday morning, a fire broke out in the upper part of the large four-story brick building corner of Fulton and Dutch-sts, occupied by Robert Craighead, book and job printing office, Walker's book bindery, and Stillman & Montrose, clothiers. When first discovered the flames were bursting forth from the windows of the bindery in the fourth-story, from whence it speedily communicated to the printing office in the stories below, and ere the lapse of many minutes the entire building was enveloped in flames, and soon after a mass of ruins. In consequence of the freezing up of the engines the firemen were considerably delayed in their operations, and while they were engaged thawing them out the flames gained considerable headway....
New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]), 24 Jan. 1852. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030213/1852-01-24/ed-1/seq-7/>
The context of Herman Melville's reference to "a third-story room" in his May 1851 letter to Hawthorne is all about the dirty job of getting his Whale-book done. Sure, he might have stayed uptown with his brother Allan and (who knows?) might even have occupied himself with writing there. On June 10th his aunt Mary Ann Chandonette Gansevoort (Guert's mother) died, and Herman was supposed to attend her funeral in Brooklyn. In the earlier letter to Hawthorne, however, his only stated objective for going was to grind, to "work and slave" on his book with a leering printer's apprentice aka "Devil" for an attendant. Not a shred of domestic comfort seems implied in Melville's grim commitment to bury himself in a third-story room. There is no mention here of family connections, no anticipation of even minimal hospitality in NYC. After the fire on Fulton burned down Craighead's workplace, his regular customer Evert A. Duyckinck remembered it as "a large building with openings into adjoining lofts, supplied with steam power, and filled by a numerous body of pressmen, compositors, and others, through the third floor." There's no question Melville went there to work. Since we know which Manhattan printer he must have employed, let's go ahead and give Herman "a third-story room" connected with the printing-office instead of Allan's uptown residence. Herman Melville at least tried to finish writing THE WHALE there, while it was "driving through the press" of Robert Craighead.
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Considering Duyckinck's dismal picture of a typical Manhattan printer's office, it can hardly be surprising that Melville would decide to quit town before his book was done. As Melville explains in his next letter to Hawthorne, this one dated June 29th:
Not entirely yet, though, am I without something to be urgent with. The "Whale" is only half through the press; for, wearied with the long delays of the printers, and disgusted with the heat and dust of the Babylonish brick-kiln of New York, I came back to the country to feel the grass, and end the book reclining on it, if I may. -- The Letters of Herman Melville, ed. Merrell R. Davis and William H. Gilman (Yale University Press, 1960) page 152It's a wonder the book ever got published that year but it did, by Richard Bentley in London, England as The Whale (October 1851); and by Harper & Brothers in New York as Moby-Dick or The Whale (November 1851). By the by, Evert Duyckinck's casual exposé of sorry working conditions in American printing-offices appeared in the January 31, 1852 issue of the New York Literary World:
Most of our printing-offices are insecure, confused, rickety-looking quarters, with narrow entrances, associated frequently with that huge paper box of combustibles, a Bindery--poorly arranged for light--with steam power on the premises, and badly ventilated, oppressive to health, opposed to the necessary neatness, and utterly insecure for property.
Around the same time, Herman Melville was back home in Pittsfield, belatedly finishing his next book Pierre, or The Ambiguities (1852). A later passage offers this equally depressing picture of Melville's enthusiast hero at work as a writer:
ON the third night following the arrival of the party in the city, Pierre sat at twilight by a lofty window in the rear building of the Apostles’. The chamber was meager even to meanness. No carpet on the floor, no picture on the wall; nothing but a low, long, and very curious-looking single bedstead, that might possibly serve for an indigent bachelor’s pallet, a large, blue, chintz-covered chest, a rickety, rheumatic, and most ancient mahogany chair, and a wide board of the toughest live-oak, about six feet long, laid upon two upright empty flour-barrels, and loaded with a large bottle of ink, an unfastened bundle of quills, a pen-knife, a folder, and a still unbound ream of foolscap paper, significantly stamped, “Ruled; Blue."
For Blues that bad there's only one cure. More Blues!
Related posts:
- Augusta Melville, letter to Allan May 16, 1851
https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2023/05/augusta-melville-letter-to-allan.html
- General and gentle readers
https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2023/05/general-and-gentle-readers.html
- Mid-to-late May maybe
https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2023/10/mid-to-late-may-maybe.html
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